ICC defers vote on radical change to way cricket is administered

Indian reports claimed Kevin Pietersen would be in the highest bracket of players available for the IPL at about £200,000. Photograph: Anthony Devlin/PA

Not for the first time in the long and mixed history of the International Cricket Council, its indecision was final when a vote on the proposals for radical change to the way the game is administered was deferred by a month.

The ICC issued a statement claiming the 13 board members had "unanimously supported" the "principles" of a working paper proposed by England, Australia and India that involves the wealthy trio of nations seizing more power and money, but several delegates seemed keen to stress afterwards that no decision had been made.

Other sources insisted the majority of the proposals had been approved and remain confident that deferral may mean little more than delaying the inevitable.

Zaka Ashraf, the chairman of the Pakistan Cricket Board has previously worked closely with his English counterpart, Giles Clarke, but would now seem to be a vocal opponent. Ashraf had talked before the meeting of forming an alternative alliance with South Africa, Sri Lanka and Bangladesh who would refuse to be cowed, or tempted, by financial threats or inducements.

"We will stick to our stance," said Ashraf who, according to some Pakistani reports, was awaiting instruction from his prime minister, Nawaz Sharif, the PCB's president. India now have a month to further flex their financial muscle, whether by firming up the implication in the proposals of a resumption of Test cricket against Pakistan – which would hand a much-needed boost to the cash-strapped PCB – or repeating their threat to walk away from the ICC.

Narayanaswami Srinivasan, the president of the Board of Control for Cricket in India, with whom Clarke has developed a close working relationship, did not attend the meeting for family reasons. Alan Isaac, the New Zealander who is the president of the ICC, and the South African chief executive, Dave Richardson, were at pains to defend the honour of Clarke, Srinivasan and the Cricket Australia chairman, Wally Edwards, in Tuesday's statement after widespread and occasionally ferocious criticism of their proposals since they were leaked earlier this month.

"Several months ago I encouraged BCCI, CA and ECB to enter into a constructive dialogue together to help resolve some of the key commercial and governance issues facing the game," Isaac said. "These leading cricket nations have worked tirelessly to produce a document which provided the basis for the past few weeks of extremely constructive discussions.

"It is obviously very disappointing that a draft position paper from these members was leaked as this prompted a debate that ignored the ongoing negotiations between all members and led to unwarranted criticism of many of those involved in the process.

"The principles agreed today provide clear evidence that through the course of further discussions over the coming weeks we can be increasingly confident in achieving consensus."

The stakes at the ICC meeting were so high that for once the Indian Premier League was overshadowed as details of next month's auction began to dribble out. Indian reports claimed Kevin Pietersen would be in the highest bracket of players available at two crore Rupees (about £200,000), with less stellar and therefore more surprising company from the Nottinghamshire pair of Alex Hales and Samit Patel. Eoin Morgan is thought to be another of the 11 England-based players to have entered the auction, although his base price has yet to emerge.

There was even some cricket on the field as Scotland took another major step towards qualifying for the 2015 World Cup in Australia and New Zealand with a 52-run victory over a Papua New Guinea team including the former England wicketkeeper Geraint Jones. The Scots, who appointed Paul Collingwood to their coaching staff before the ICC qualifying tournament in New Zealand, now need to beat Kenya on Thursday to secure their first place in a world tournament since 1999.